


Zugzwang

by peaceloveandjocularity, stateofintegrity



Series: Atonement [2]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:47:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24498922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peaceloveandjocularity/pseuds/peaceloveandjocularity, https://archiveofourown.org/users/stateofintegrity/pseuds/stateofintegrity
Summary: A sequel to Chinese Medicine. Charles helps Klinger on the road to recovery, hoping he will have a better life than the one he's chosen.
Relationships: Maxwell Klinger/Charles Emerson Winchester III
Series: Atonement [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1938676
Comments: 6
Kudos: 13





	Zugzwang

Klinger did not “hit the roof” when he entered his tent after sentry duty and found it occupied by Major Charles Emerson Winchester III; for one, the tent didn’t have much in the way of a roof, anyway. For two, he was too tired. And maybe he’d known that Winchester would eventually come. 

“Everything okay, Major?”

“Obviously not. But you look exhausted.” He surprised Klinger by standing, taking the rifle from him, unloading it and leaning it against the wall, then taking his coat. If he could have gotten him to sit down, Klinger thought his shoes would have been next. 

“Turn down service is more involved than I remember,” he joked. 

“Goodnight, Max. Rest easy.”

“You don’t have to go, Major. I’m tired but it’s not like I’ll drop right off to sleep anyway. You need to work on your poker face, though. Worried isn’t your best look.” 

He saw Winchester struggle. Whatever he had to say was important to drag him here in the middle of the night, but he didn’t want to make things worse. Maybe there would be a better time? 

Klinger slid the tent’s only chair toward him. “Major, if there’s one person other than the Colonel in this camp who’s earned the right to keep me up and say whatever he wants, it’s you.”

Charles didn’t wring his hands but the sense that he longed to was there. “It’s… it won’t be easy to hear.”

“But you think I should.”

“Yes.”

“Because?” 

“I think… that is, I believe it will help.”  _ It’s what I wish someone had told me.  _

Klinger gave in, sitting on the bed and bundling up because he’d gone hours in the cold. 

“I know,” Charles began, “that you’ve spoken with Dr. Freedman. But I know you are still struggling, too. I think I can even say why. You feel… rage at being helpless, grief. Fear. And under all of that, guilt.”  _ Guilt because you responded _ . 

He waited a beat to see if Klinger would kick him out. 

“I know those paths you’re trapped walking in your mind not because I was there with you… but because it’s been done to me, too.” 

Klinger was on his feet in seconds. “Major!”

Charles sighed. “Damn it, Klinger! I did not tell you this dark secret because I want your compassion, so kindly stop looking at me in that heartbreaking way.”

The Corporal looked hurt at that and Charles softened, stepped forward to pull the blankets back up on Klinger’s shoulders. “What I am trying to say, and bungling badly, is that I am okay. You, on the other hand, are not. And I am afraid…” He swallowed, hating the words that he had to speak. “Maxwell, I have been alone for a very long time. I got hurt and so I,” his head dropped; he hid his eyes. “I thought that if no one ever touched me, I’d never have to risk that pain again.” When he looked up, his eyes were bright and agonized. “Since we were captured, Max, you haven’t allowed anyone to touch you. You flinch or move aside.” 

“Major, there weren’t exactly people lined up outside my door before then. The dresses, you know?”

“Then go to Seoul. Find a nice geisha girl. Remind yourself that touch exists beyond pain. Just don’t cut yourself off from human contact, please. Klinger, I’ve seen you with patients, with the baby that was abandoned here. You’re meant for a full life. If I am to be the death of that, I would rather have died that day. Do you understand?” 

“Major… you didn’t, I’m not…” He gave up and sighed. “Alright, maybe I’m having a hard time. A little. But it’ll pass.”

“Will it?” He held up his left hand, bare of a ring. 

“What do you want from me, Major? I’m not Hawkeye. I don’t…” he gave a humorless laugh. “I ought to be able to say these things to you.”

“You may speak or withhold whatever you wish. I only want to help you. Which brings me to another suggestion if you’ll hear it.” 

“I’m listening.”

He was terrified, Klinger saw then. “You forgave me once. I hope you won’t have to again.”

“I would. All day long.” 

_ That’s what I want to protect. Your kind heart. Even if it kills me.  _ “If not someone from the 4077th or a geisha girl… what about me? I hurt you, perhaps I can mend this.” 

“It’s not your job to,”

“It is my wish to.”

“Because you feel guilty?”

Charles had expected the question. “Because I told you I would protect you. Because I failed. But more than that, because I think I can spare you the lonely road I took. I do not know if you need to hear it, but I will defer to you entirely. Your pace. Your preference.”  _ Whatever you need to feel safe again _ . 

Klinger managed a sad excuse for a smile. “You’ll be the geisha girl?”

“With two significant advantages: no travel and no cost.”  _ Except for that terrible price we’ve already paid and which I would set aside everything to undo _ . 

“Let me get this straight, Major. You’re saying that those nights when I’m cold and scared and can’t sleep, you’ll climb in here with me and keep me warm?”

“Yes.”

“And when I feel better?”

“I’ll go. And nothing more will be said, by me, to anyone ever.” He readied his last argument. “Max, in chess there is a situation called zugzwang. You are compelled to move but doing so is often ruinous. I could have done nothing at that aid station. But I could not die knowing I’d left you alone. Nor could I live to see you killed.” The way he said this told Klinger that the image of his bloodied body, light fading from its eyes, was still with Winchester, near enough to touch. “Perhaps I made the wrong choice. I know I did you great evil. You’ve every right to turn me away. Maybe asking you at all was another great wrong. But I could not stand by and watch you suffer here, now, anymore than I could do nothing there.” 

_ It’s too bad no one spoke English when we were captured. You could have talked us free, I think.  _ “You really think it will make a difference?”

“I do. Just, please think about it, Max. If you … if I can help, I will.” 

Klinger watched him walk into the dark. 

***

After Winchester’s revelation, Klinger began to watch the Major more closely. Winchester had promised to try to feel better, but the bruised rings under his eyes spoke to sleeplessness and those eyes remained haunted. Finally, Klinger went to the Swamp on a night when he knew the Captains would be gone. 

He didn’t even say hello.  _ If it will help you _ , he thought,  _ help me _ . “I can’t sleep.” He didn’t add, “Because I know you’re not sleeping.” 

Winchester was instantly alert and gracious. Standing he took his coat and drew him into the bed.  _ This is impossible,  _ Klinger thought, facing him, because he had no memory of crossing the room or taking off his shoes. Winchester had lowered the lights. He didn’t speak - he just  _ allowed.  _ Everything. Anything. And Klinger surprised himself with the violence of it, surfacing only when he realized he’d forgotten Winchester entirely and was only blindly and forcibly fucking him.  _ Punishing  _ him. “Oh my god,” he moaned and tried to escape. Winchester held him fast, tight against him.  _ In  _ him. “Don’t you dare,” he said.

“I can’t!” Klinger wailed. “I don’t want to hurt you! You helped me!” 

_ And some part of you hates me for what I was forced to endure.  _ “It’s alright. I promised you anything. I meant it.” 

It released him, shook him like a gale, and left him. Catharsis. 

He emerged from it to find that Charles had cleaned him up and wrapped him up and was now laying beside him. They weren’t touching and Klinger stared at him, wondering.  _ Oh, Major. You are more and better than anybody here knows.  _

“Would you like me to move to Hunnicutt’s bunk?” 

“No. Major?”

“Yes?” 

He picked up his arm to move under it. “There. That’s better.” 

Klinger fell asleep quickly. Charles stayed awake. He had been honest with Klinger about how long he had been alone. This was new and strange and he tried to hide from himself how very much he wanted the warmth of the man beside him to soak into his skin. He had agreed to this to fix Klinger - to spare Klinger his fate.  _ You will heal,  _ he thought.  _ You won’t be twisted and barren inside like me. You’ll marry. Father children with your pretty eyes.  _ The last thought came even as he sought to volley it back into the chasm in his mind where he buried all such unwanted things:  _ And I will miss the feel of you - which I do not and never could deserve - for the rest of my life.  _

***

Similar nights became their new normal, though Klinger was never moved to repeat the raw violence of their first joining. If anything, he seemed to treasure Charles’ impossible gentleness, the way he slowed time with slow touches, with the minute attentions he lavished on inch after inch of the skin he revealed. Charles had wanted him to remember that he could be touched and not hurt for it - and he was a good teacher, slowly restoring Klinger’s confidence until he would moan for him, cry out for him, even guide him, shamelessly. 

One afternoon when they had stolen away. Klinger lazed beside him, running his fingers up and down his naked arm. “Major?”

Charles held back the endearment he longed to speak. “Max?”

“Is it hard for you?”

“What?”

“You told me that you decided to be alone because of something that happened at school, but you gave that up to help me.”

_ I would cut off my fingers to help you _ , Charles thought sadly. “Touching you is no hardship, I promise you.”  _ Letting you go, however…  _ “Especially if it allows you to have the life you deserve after this place.” 

“You say that a lot. What kind of life are you planning?” 

“Nothing you do not already know about. Return to Boston. Return to work. Enjoy what civilization has to offer.”

“Alone?”

The question surprised him so much that he answered truthfully. “Yes.”

“Why is that okay for you but not for me?” 

“My path was set before my feet long ago, Max.”

“Why? Because of one incident?”

“One incident that showed me who - and what - I really am.” 

“Which is what?”

“You’re full of questions this afternoon.” 

“And you’re trying not to answer me. Here.” He maneuvered himself until he was sprawled over him, looking into his eyes. Charles' chest rose and fell rapidly and Klinger rose and fell with it. “Now you’re stuck.” 

“I can lift you well enough and you know it.”

“You can but you won’t. So answer me. What are you that makes you think you should be alone?”

He avoided labeling himself even in his own mind, but he owed Klinger everything. Very, very quietly, he said, “Attracted to men.” 

“Yeah. So what? So am I.” 

He didn’t lift Klinger, but he sat up so fast, the smaller man slid down his body. “What!?” 

“I’ve been with guys and gals, Major. Figured you could tell. So you tell me - should  _ I  _ be alone for the rest of my life?” 

“Of course not!” It was exactly what he’d been trying to prevent. 

“I’m not educated like you, Major, but it seems to me that what applies to me should apply to you, too.” 

Charles' face showed that he wanted to argue, but his eyes were bewildered, trying to process, trying to catch up. 

“And you know what? I think we can kill two birds with one stone here.” 

He sensed what was happening and feared it to the suddenly iced over marrow of his bones. “Max?”

Klinger picked up his hand, drew it to his lips. “Come on, Charles. You had to have noticed.”

He hadn’t, but he  _ heard it _ in that moment, the affection in his voice.  _ Oh no. _ For a moment, he couldn’t even think of how to address this shining-eyed creature, but he did withdraw his hand; it had gone cold in Klinger’s grip. “Maxwell,”  _ darling, my love _ . He reached for his jacket, sought to throw some barrier between them. 

Klinger was alert, bright-eyed. “I don’t like the way you sound, Major.”  __

Charles had never imagined he could  _ lie _ to Klinger. The Corporal was too damn canny for it. “This isn’t…” he was breathing so rapidly that it was difficult to speak. “I never meant to convince you…”

There were many possible reactions to this patently absurd statement but the last one Charles would have predicted was laughter. Crawling up his prone frame with a dexterity Charles had come to admire under other circumstances, Klinger caught his mouth, plundered it, closing his eyes in the face of Charles’ wild stare. When he drew back, he ran his tongue over his lips, savoring. His eyes were darker, Charles thought wonderingly, than he’d ever seen them. “Don’t shame your alma mater, Major. You’re smarter than that.” 

Charles trembled under him and his eyes shined with the desperation sweeping through him. Klinger placed a finger on his lips. “You’re wrong. All that stuff I see in your eyes - it’s not true.”

“Max…!” It was almost a whine. 

“Yeah, yeah. I knew you’d make it difficult. Want proof. Kind of a shame though, Major, since we’re already undressed. So listen up. I wanna get through this quick.”

He tried to interrupt again, convinced this should be stopped, shut down, turned from. 

“I let you have your say,” Klinger reminded him. “Hush.”

He couldn’t do otherwise, remembering the way he’d come to the Corporal’s tent, the brazen offer he had made - to make his body a bandage for the very wounds he’d inflicted. 

“You didn’t  _ make _ me anything, Charles. I was interested in guys way before you. And guess what? I don’t think there’s anything wrong with me.” He held himself up to kiss his nose. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with  _ you _ either. In fact, I think you’re wonderful.”

“I  _ hurt _ you!”

“And then you fixed me. What? I’m supposed to ignore the second one?” 

“Yes, because the first one is so awful!” 

“Okay, Major, but let me lay this one on you. I think you forgave that person who hurt you a long time ago. If things had been reversed back there and I had hurt you, would you forgive me?”

“Yes.”

“And do you think you could fall in love with me?”

“ _ Could _ ?”

Klinger’s smile was hard to look on without sunglasses. “Me too.” He twined their fingers again, holding tighter this time. “So, are you going to leave me alone or are you going to make sure we have a happy ending?” 

When Charles stayed still and uncertain, Klinger employed his last bargaining chip. “I looked up that chess term you taught me, Major. I know we went through some bad stuff together. But I learned another term, too. A rule, I guess. You play, so you tell me if I’m wrong. Don’t the rules say that if you touch a piece, you have to move it? You’ve had your hands all over me.”

_ I’ve reduced a Lebanese Corporal to researching chess. If that isn’t love, what is?  _ “Alright, Maxwell. If I follow this mad analogy of yours,”

“ _ Yours _ first,” Klinger shot back.

“Ours, then. If I follow it, where is it, exactly, that you would have me move you to?”

“Wherever you are.”

He sighed, pulled the Corporal’s head against his chest, most happily defeated. “I think I can agree to that.”

End! 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
